Piling or magazine plants for elongated bands



Feb. 26, 1963 P. s. E. FREDRIKSSON 3,079,014

PILING OR MAGAZINE PLANTS FOR ELONGATED BANDS Filed NOV. 6, 1953 3 Sheets-Sheet 1- psvmn ENGELBREKT FREDRIKSSON IbfVENTOR Feb. 26, 1963 P. s. E. FREDRIKSSON 3,079,014 I FILING OR MAGAZINE PLANTS FOR ELONGATED BANDS Filed Nov. 6, 1953 3 Sheets-Sheet 2 Mum].

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ATTORNEY 3,079,014 FILING 0R MAGAZINE PLANTS FOR ELONGATED BANDS Filed Nov. 6, 1953 1963 P. s. E. FREDRIKSSON 3 Sheets-Sheet 3 INVENTOR 4;. ATTORNEY g u a mm States Patent Office 3,079,014 PILlNG OR MAGAZINE PLANTS FOR ELONGATED BANDS Per Sven Engelhrekt Fredriksson, Vasteras, Sweden, as-

signor to Aktiebolaget Svenslra Metallverken, Vasteras, Sweden, a joint-stock company of Sweden Filed Nov. 6, 1953, Ser. No. 3%,693 Claims priority, application Sweden Nov. 7, 1952 7 Claims. (Cl. 2146) The present invention relates to a piling or magazine plant for elongated, relatively wide bands or strips, preferably of metal or metallic alloys, e.g. brass, or the kind which comprises a conveyor path having a pusher device for said bands and a storing plane for the latter.

In handling large lengths of relatively wide bands, particularly metal bands or bands of metallic alloys having a considerable weight, great difiiculties are encountered, which should be overcome at transport, piling, storing and transposition thereof. Said difficulties are accentuated especially when dealing with metal bands or the like, which upon rolling or heat treatment have a relatively high temperature and for that reason may not readily be transpositioned manually.

With the intention to remove the abovementioned difiiculties in connection with conveyors, preferably in roller conveyors, onto which, e.g. fresh rolled bands from a rolling mill, are discharged in their entire length, pusher devices of various designs have been arranged for pushing the bands sideways ofi the conveyor. In certain of said devices the bands are allowed to drop by gravity down to a storing plane, frequently being located considerably below the working plane of the conveyor, which involves difficulty in obtaining even and stable piles and that easily damaged bands are crushed or in another way deformed in a manner making them unfit for further treatment. Asa further inconvenience also the very fact should be taken into account that such bands being dropped against the storing plane will bring about a noise, which of course will act highly disturbing.

In order to remedy said inconveniences and to reduce the manual work to a minimum, it has been suggested to lift the bands off the conveyor path by means of a row of suction cups located along and above the band, which are urged-downwardly against the band so that the same through the action of the atmospheric pressure will be retained by the cups and e.g. on a crane device travelling in the ceiling be elevated, pushed off and placed down onto the storing plane.

Disregarding the considerable costs of the structural arrangement and the fact that it is necessary after e.g. a hot milling operation to have the bands in the first place left to cool, due to the fact that neither rubber not other known materials for suction cups are capable of resisting the temperatures in question, one cannot always rely upon the suction cups sufiiciently to fit the band, for which reason it may happen that certain parts of the band will leave hold'and bulge down. This may in turn result therein that one suction cup after the other may leave hold, the entire band getting dropped in a non-controllable way, which in severe cases may cause accidents.

.The invention, which has for its purpose to remove all of the abovementioned inconveniences and to render pos sible a controllable handling of elongated, relatively wide bands, is mainly characterized by a number of pusher means arranged along the conveyor path and capable of being displaced into its transverse direction and a number of sustaining rails or the like for the bands displaceable in its transverse direction into a position laterally of the conveyor, the pusher means as well as the sustaining rails being actuated to move on one hand individually (com 1 14, which are thus simultaneously put into rotationpositively prising also individual sets thereof) and on the other hand in unison, for the purpose to permit the bands to be laterally pushed off the conveyor to get primarily stored on the sustaining rails and thereupon successively laid down upon the storing plane from end to end by retracting the sustaining rails one by one or in sets to their home position.

The invention will now be more clearly explained with. reference to an embodiment diagrammatically shown m the attached drawing and in connection herewith further characterizing features of the invention will be set forth.

FIGURE 1 is a perspective view of a piling or magazine plant according to the invention showing a part of a. roller conveyor and a band in course of handling being just laid down upon a pile of bands resting on a storing plane.

FIGURE 2 is a section along the line II-II in FIG- URE 1.

FIGURE 3 is a plan view of a part of the roller con- In the drawing in FIGURE 1 a roller conveyor is H lustrated which comprises a plurality of rollers 2 rotatably supported in bearings 3, which are in turn carried by two parallel conveyor beams 4. The conveyor beams are sustained above the floor designated by 5 by means of a number of supporting members 6.

The rollers may either be free-running or positively driven, but are assumed in the described example to be operated so that bands may be advanced thereon." i

flanges 10 of the channels 9, thus carrying the rail 8 sothat the same may be displaced into the transverse direc Said displacement is preferably tion of the conveyor. performed by machinery means, e.g. by means of a chain drive, which in accordance with FIGURE 2 consists of two sprocket wheels 14 and 15 for each rail, which latterwheels are stationarily mounted one at each side of the; conveyor.

Passing over the sprocket wheels is a chain, 16, which is fixed by means of-a pivot-.17 to the-rail 8,

which latter when operating the chain in either directionis thus forced to move into the tranverse direction of the conveyor.

Each chain and consequently each sustaining rail 8 may be individually operated by a separate operating device of any suitable kind or the operation may take place in unison by using a number of rails 8 in sets.

An example of such operation in sets is shown in FIG-,

URE 3, wherein sets comprising two rails 8 are shown as operated by a common electric driving motor 18,- which via a worm gear 19 and clutches 20' will impart rotational movement to two shafts 21 and 22. Said shafts carry, as shown in the figure,.each"one sprocket wheel Patented Feb. 26, 1963 Furthermore reference numeral 7 designates a number and via the chains 16 displace the rails 8 into the trans verse direction of the conveyor.

The invention, of course, does not merely include the case that the sustaining rails be operated by means of chains or similar arrangements but also other operating methods and arrangements, which are capable in an adeqnate way to reciprocate the rails in the transverse direc tion of the conveyor, are possible. The source of power may also vary from case to case according to the available equipment or other resources.

The pusher device for the bands operates in the following way:

'A band, which being for example discharged from a rolling mill, is moved upon the conveyor into its longitudinal direction from the right to the left in FIGURE 1. In a certain advanced position the band is brought to a stop, whereupon all the pusher means 7 and the sustaining rails 8 simultaneously are brought to move into the transverse direction of the conveyor towards the viewer in FIGURE 1. All the pusher means 7 then at first will come into contact with the adjacent edge of the band, whereupon all the band is aligned on the conveyor and lo atedin such a position pushed off the same into the abovementioned direction. After completed motion of the 7 the band will finally assume a position shown and described pusher means entirely outside the same and is then sustained by the rails projecting frorn the conveyor as shelves or brackets. From this position the band shall be laid down upon the underlying storing plane 5, which process in accordance with the invention is carried out from one end of the band to the other. In the example shown the lying down isassumed to take place from the right to the left and to he carried out through individual or setwise retraction of the rails 8 farthest to the right and then successively along the entire conveyor. The right end of the hand then will drop relatively softly against the storing planev and will come to rest in its correct position on the same. successively longer portions of the band will come to rest against the storing plane and the increasing frictional surface between the band-and the storing plane willretain theband in its aligned position so that it finally will en-. tirely rest upon the storing plane in a plan extension. After one band has been laid down a plurality of successive bands may be stored upon each other until finally a pile of bands of a desired height designated by. 23 in FIGURE 1' is obtained. Obviously all bands in said pile will lie correctly aligned in; the same position, where.-. by the 'pile at subsequent magazining or the like will permit easier handling.

"In order to render possible continuous discharge of the bands from the conveyor it is required, however, that the pile of bands formed should be removed when it approaches the elevation of the rails. This is performed. in accordance with the invention by means of a magazin-. ing lateral conveyor for the piles, which. will be described with reference to FIGURE 1 and FIGURESv -7.:

From the diagrammatic illustration. in FIGURE 1 itwill' be evident that the storing plane 5, which may. constitute a concrete floor or the like, is provided with counttarsunkfgrooves or channels 24, in which a number of carriages or runners 25 may be displaced in their longitudinal direction. The runners 25 may be raisedand.

lowered: and displaced aswell in a raised as in a lowered.

position. All runners are commonly operable at the same rate and are adapted to be lowered into the grooves 24 below the pilesv 23, to elevate, and displace same. in the. longitudinaldirection of the grooves and further to lay down same in a desired; position of displacement on the storing planef From FIGURES 5-7 the arrangement of each separate runner 25 is shown, wherein in the groove 24 are placed two channels 26 having the flanges facing each other. The lower fiangescarry each. one rail 27, upon which rails tzhsecarriage. or runner 25 may be displaced upon wheels The runner 25 is arranged to be displaced into the longitudinal direction of the groove 24 by means of a chain 29, the one strand of which is fixed to the runner 25 at the point 30 in order to be able to drive the same. The chain 29 runs over a sprocket wheel 31 at each end of the groove 24 and may be tightened at one end by means of an adequate resilient chain tightener generally designated by 32.

As to operation of the chain 24 reference is made to FIGURE 6, wherein the sprocket wheel 31 isrigidly attached to a driving shaft 33, which via clutch 34, a worm gear 35, and a belt drive 36 may be driven from an electric motor 37. In the embodiment shown the driving motion of the motor 37 is transmitted to all runners 25. It is, of course, also possible to arrange individual motors for one or several runners in sets.

The motor 37, as has been mentioned above, will bring about displacement of all runners 25, but it is also necessary to render possible lowering and raising of the runners 25 according to desire in order to permit handlingof the piles of bands 23. To this end the beams 26 in the embodimentshown are arranged to be raised and lowered by means of a hydraulic or pneumatic device. Said device consists of two plungers 33, which at each one end of the beams operate in each one cylinder 39. Each cylinder 39 is connected to a source of pressure (notshown) via afluid pressure line 40. By supplying pressure medium to the cylinders 39 the plungers 38--are forced to elevate to a desired level determined by abutments 41, the beams 26 being raised and the runners 25 thus lifted. A corresponding lowering may then take place by draining the pressure medium.

The lateral conveyor according to the inventionoperates in the following way:

If e.g. a complete pile is to be removed laterally from the rangev close to the conveyor 1, the pressure medium is drained from all of the cylinders 39, until all runners are lowered below the level of the floor 5, whereupon the chains 29 are brought to feed the runners 25 in unison below-theactual pile and to stop the same in said position.

Thereafter pressure medium is supplied to the cylinders 39, so that the plungers will raise all bearns 26*so that the pile of bands will come to rest upon the-runners 25 above the floor level-5. Insaid position the-chains 29 may again be started totake the pile awayto an adequate place. whereit may be laid down by draining again the pressure. medium out of the cylinders 39. By this arrangement thus one pile of bands may be placed adjacentto the otherwithin theentire. working surface of the lateral con veyor. The runners 25 areassumed in theirlowered: POSl'. tion tobe able topass below magazined piles of bands into the entire. transverse direction of the lateral conveyor, so that desired rearrangement within the magazine is rendered possible.

In piling the bands in this way, however, further problems will arise in removing the bands for being further machined: and handled, which here as little as in the roller. conveyor mayv be performed manually in a. convenient manner. To this end, in accordance with the invention, a particular feed device is arranged to cooperate with the lateral conveyor and the storing plane 5'. Said feed device, which. may be of various kinds and constnictions,

is, however, preferably equipped with two cooperating rollers 42 and. 43 and with a band separating member 44 suitably arranged on a carriage running on rails, the carriage being fed in, the separating member-44 being below the upper band or hands is moved into the pile, the ends of the bands beingentered between the rollers 42 and 43 and the bands carried away onto a conveyor path or the like. A feed device which preferably may be used together with the invention is described in my copending applica-tion Serial No. 394,832, filed November 27, 1953, now Patent No. 2,830,713, and corresponding to my Swedish application Serial No. 10285/52 filed November 275, 1952, and will not be described in detail here.

Through the principally simple, but nevertheless eifective combination of the pusher device, lateral conveyor and feed device according to the invention an extraordinarily advantageous and easily operated plant for handling elongated, relatively wide bands has been obtained, which removes all those inconveniences being encountered up to now when handling such bands.

The invention is not limited to the embodiment shown and described but may be varied in several respects within the scope of the basic inventive idea.

The fact that in the description reference is made mainly to metal bands or the like does not, however, exclude that the invention with the same effect may be used in connection with bands of various materials, e.g. plast, boards, etc.

Having now described the invention, what I claim as new and desire to secure by Letters Patent is:

1. In a plant of the character described, the combination with a conveyor for supporting a length of strip material and laterally adjacent storage means providing a storage bed located below the level of the conveyor, of transfer means comprising a plurality of pusher elements and a plurality of supporting elements located in spaced relation along said conveyor and movable transversely of the length of the conveyor, means for simultaneously moving said transfer means transversely of the conveyor to cause said pusher elements to engage one edge of a strip of material and push the strip laterally ofi the conveyor to be supported by said supporting elements, and means for selectively retracting said supporting elements in predetermined order to cause the strip of material supported thereby to be lowered progressively of its length by gravity for support by said storage means.

2. Apparatus as defined in claim 1 in which said conveyor comprises a plurality of spaced rollers and said pusher elements comprise a plurality of tongues each movable laterally of the conveyor between two adjacent rollers.

3. Apparatus as defined in claim 2 in which said pusher elements are carried by said supporting elements to provide a plurality of transfer units, each of said units being transversely reciprocable between two adjacent rollers.

4. Apparatus as defined in claim 3 including separate driving means for separately controlling the movement of different ones of said transfer units, whereby to enable the supporting elements to be selectively withdrawn.

5. Apparatus as defined in claim 1 in which said supporting elements are located entirely below the work-supporting plane of the conveyor.

6. Apparatus as defined in claim 5 in which said supporting elements are reciprocable in fixed guides.

7. Apparatus as defined in claim 6 in which said supporting elements are carried by wheels moving in said guides.

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 870,592 Smitmans Nov. 12, 1907 1,306,158 Walker June 10, 1919 1,556,695 Kronborg Oct. 13, 1925 1,569,032 Reichel Jan. 12, 1926 1,637,420 Klein Aug. 2, 1927 1,748,226 Hunt Feb. 25, 1930 1,848,898 McFarland Mar. 8, 1932 1,910,267 Smith May 23, 1933 1,931,628 Von Reis Oct. 24, 1933 1,950,377 Allen Mar. 13, 1934 2,000,273 Conklin et al May 7, 1935 2,470,795 Socke May 24, 1949 2,506,550 Morrison May 2, 1950 2,549,202 Idelman Apr. 17, 1951 2,635,729 Drake Apr. 21, 1953 

1. IN A PLANT OF THE CHARACTER DESCRIBED, THE COMBINATION WITH A CONVEYOR FOR SUPPORTING A LENGTH OF STRIP MATERIAL AND LATERALLY ADJACENT STORAGE MEANS PROVIDING A STORAGE BED LOCATED BELOW THE LEVEL OF THE CONVEYOR, OF TRANSFER MEANS COMPRISING A PLURALITY OF PUSHER ELEMENTS AND A PLURALITY OF SUPPORTING ELEMENTS LOCATED IN SPACED RELATION ALONG SAID CONVEYOR AND MOVABLE TRANSVERSELY OF THE LENGTH OF THE CONVEYOR, MEANS FOR SIMULTANEOUSLY MOVING SAID TRANSFER MEANS TRANSVERSELY OF THE CONVEYOR TO CAUSE SAID PUSHER ELEMENTS TO ENGAGE ONE EDGE OF A STRIP OF MATERIAL AND PUSH THE STRIP LATERALLY OFF THE CONVEYOR TO BE SUPPORTED BY SAID SUPPORTING ELEMENTS IN PREDETERMINED ORDER TO CAUSE THE STRIP OF MATERIAL SUPPORTED THEREBY TO BE LOWERED PROGRESSIVELY OF ITS LENGTH BY GRAVITY FOR SUPPORT BY SAID STORAGE MEANS. 